Point of Contact
Point of Contact
Eldmia Ega.
Among those working as adventurers in the capital, there was now no one who didn't know the name.
He'd started with all sorts of grim monikers—Mad Dog, Madman, Human Hunter—but soon enough, among those with real skill, he went by other names.
After the rest were filtered away, two aliases remained: Light Sword and Counterattack.
The first came from what every witness said: whenever his sword flashed, an accelerated slash followed. The second was earned because anyone who messed with him, in any way whatsoever, inevitably got hit back.
It was obvious when you thought about it, but during ordinary adventurer work there was rarely any chance to see why he deserved the name Counterattack. As a result, Eldmia Ega was usually known as Light Sword.
Yet in an exceedingly brief moment, the party came to understand with absolute certainty why the name Human Hunter had once been attached to him.
"So what are you friends up to, lighting a campfire in the middle of the road?"
After closing some distance, Eldmia dismounted smoothly and approached the men with a smile. They froze for a moment at his attitude, which held not an ounce of wariness, then promptly burst out laughing and began to encircle him. Even so, Eldmia's back remained utterly at ease.
Soon enough, when the completely off-guard bandits had surrounded him and were about to draw their weapons, Eldmia moved.
'Aura...?'
Yekaterina wielded her massive war hammer with the body she'd been born with; she still hadn't awakened aura. But her natural gifts extended to her senses as well as her physique, and although she couldn't use aura herself, she could precisely detect the unfamiliar energy produced by the flows of Mana and aura.
That was how she realized Eldmia was using something completely unlike any aura she'd ever seen or felt. It was heavier—denser, somehow—and the power he wielded only looked similar to aura at first glance. She wondered whether aura at some level beyond her understanding might feel like that, but it remained unlike anything she'd sensed before.
From the instant she sensed it, Eldmia took less than twenty seconds to disarm the bandits without ever drawing his own sword, stab three of them to death, and leave four more fatally wounded.
"Astonishing skill."
Even Gaendal couldn't hold back his admiration at the sight. Even his eyes, which had seen the widest variety of combat among the party, were filled with amazement.
As if it were a choreographed routine, he snatched a blade, slashed and stabbed and hurled it, then stripped the next bandit's weapon in between and repeated it all. There wasn't an instant's hesitation in the entire sequence. If anything, those bold and utterly uninhibited actions made the bandits falter and panic, opening fresh gaps.
The three men who were still mostly unharmed finally chose to run, stumbling away without even managing a scream. Eldmia picked up two axes he'd taken from the dead bandits, tossed them lightly once to judge their weight, hurled one at each of two fleeing men, and charged the last.
The party watched the two axes split the backs of two skulls with perfect accuracy, then saw Eldmia catch the final bandit, rip the dagger from the man's own belt, and drive it into his spine. They applauded in complete sincerity.
◈
Honestly, when those bastards surrounded me, I had exactly one thought in mind.
Equilibrium.
John Preston fighting to save a puppy, plunging into the middle of six men and gunning them down—that scene had stayed with me as one of countless memorable moments. Not that I'd ever imagined I'd end up with a body that could do the same thing with cold steel instead of guns.
Anyway, my body enhanced by Magic Power, combined with the openings created by careless bandits, made the surprise attack work even better than I'd expected. I'd also wanted to test whether the wound in my palm from when I'd met Ragnis would get in the way, but I finished without the slightest discomfort. Ever since I took Delt's head, my belief that surprise attacks always created an advantage had only grown stronger.
"Impressive! Feels like watching a seasoned mercenary! Even if I wrapped myself in aura, I couldn't manage movements like that!"
Gin's booming praise and applause drowned most of it out, but the others clapped as well, apparently satisfied with what they'd seen. Compared with the people we'd be fighting from here on, beating these bandits was hardly worth boasting about. Still, at least I'd shown enough that when the real fighting began, I could argue for what I thought the situation required instead of being dragged along with everyone else's decisions.
"I agree. The aura I can sense from you is faint, but you handle it remarkably well. It's only a matter of time before you reach Purple-rank."
I couldn't exactly tell him, 'That's because it isn't aura, it's Magic Power,' so I dusted off my hands, smiled, and accepted Gaendal's praise.
"It's embarrassing to hear that kind of thing after dealing with bandits. Still, not bad to prove I'm not dead weight."
"Dead weight? If anything, I'm starting to think you might be the best fit for this commission. Enough to wonder if it wouldn't be better to switch leaders, even if I formally hold the role."
Unless Engrim had appointed Gaendal by coin flip, there was absolutely no reason to doubt his ability.
"Command and fighting are completely different. I'm only good at the fighting part."
I'd only gotten this far because I'd spent my entire life training to kill one Demonfolk bastard. It wasn't because I was some kind of genius.
Thanks to my memories from my previous life, I'd poured even the time that should normally have gone into basic knowledge and education into combat instead. Without those memories, I'd have become a killing machine so lopsided that ordinary life would've been impossible. Considering how absurdly specialized my upbringing had been, being capable of at least this much was only fair.
Field command hadn't been part of that training, naturally, so I decided to draw a firm line before misplaced expectations turned poisonous. I answered him lightly and mounted my horse. Yekaterina rode up beside me almost immediately, and what she said was genuinely surprising.
"Later, when you've got time, how about a sparring match at the guild training grounds? That aura you just used seemed a little unusual. Got me curious."
She was the first person who'd ever described the power I used as aura as unusual. Everyone else either couldn't sense it at all or dismissed it as nothing more than weak aura.
"Unusual?"
"Yeah. The wielder doesn't notice? It's kind of... heavy, I guess? It's definitely different from the aura I've felt before. I can't use aura myself, but I'm damn good at sensing it."
"What? You swing that thing without aura?"
I wasn't joking—Yekaterina's war hammer was not a standard size. We only called it a war hammer for lack of a better term. The thing was such a monstrous size it was like someone had welded an anvil to a hammerhead. You could probably call it a siege ram and someone would believe you.
Worse, to withstand its own weight, the weapon didn't contain a single piece of wood. It was solid metal from head to pommel. And she could swing that in actual combat using nothing but muscle?
"I swing it with pure muscle! That's my pride!"
"Don't you have entirely too many things to be proud of? I'm not sure I could even swing that thing without aura myself."
"Hahaha! Nice of you to say so! Anyway, we're definitely sparring!"
No, I'd meant that genuinely, but she took it as empty flattery.
Still, there was no reason to stop someone who was setting out in such a good mood just to argue about it. We stripped a few coin purses from the bandits' bodies and set off again.
Afterward, apart from stopping once to rest the horses midway, we rode without pause. Only when we reached the forest near our destination were we able to get proper rest.
"I think my pelvis is shattered..."
Rellie, easily the least accustomed to physical exertion among us, groaned and couldn't get down from her horse properly. Laughing, Yekaterina lifted her down.
"Honestly, I'm pretty worn out too. Why didn't you say we should rest a little along the way?"
"For this sort of thing, I'd rather push through and then rest properly than keep taking half-measures. Besides, I don't like being the reason the plan falls behind."
I'd met so few mages in this other world I could count them on one hand, but every single one I'd encountered had been a genuinely decent person.
While Gaendal, who had the most scouting experience, went off to recon the surroundings alone, the rest of us were to set up camp. We'd decided to let Rellie rest a while longer and split the remaining work among ourselves.
There wasn't much to divide: gather firewood, pitch the tents, and prepare food. Normally we'd have camped with nothing but sleeping bags, but the guild had already surveyed this safe area and thoughtfully supplied tents as well, adding one more job to the list.
Yekaterina and Gin apparently weren't used to pitching tents and stood there tilting their heads at the equipment. I stepped forward with complete confidence instead. With Rellie helping hold things in place, I finished setting everything up and put down the hammer in satisfaction.
"Wow. So this is how you pitch this tent."
The reason I'd been able to step up so confidently despite never having camped in either my past life or my current one was simple. The guild had provided the A-frame tent I'd seen to the point of nausea back in the army!
The first time I'd seen this son of a bitch shape, I'd gotten dizzy as if I'd somehow enlisted again. But thankfully, this was such a superior piece of gear that even comparing it to the army's version felt almost criminal. The frame wasn't just two poles and done; it was a freestanding U-shaped frame, so as long as Rellie held it roughly in place, I didn't have to worry about the frame toppling over with every hammer swing.
Most importantly, one look at the fabric told me it was both waterproof and exceptionally well insulated. Sure enough, Rellie noticed the same thing immediately, analyzed it, and announced that the tent was a magic item.
"I don't know what kind of magical beast this material came from, but at this level of craftsmanship, it has to be one of the Library's newest inventions."
Even if it was just on loan, Engrim really did come through with solid support. I made a mental note to definitely buy one for myself later, once all this was finished and I set off traveling with Asilie.
We quickly finished the men's and women's tents, spread blankets inside, stowed our gear, and crawled in for a moment. The interior had a genuine coziness I'd never experienced so much as a grain of during my military service.
"Are the blankets enchanted too?"
"No, those are just ordinary blankets."
So even the blankets in the military were just pieces of shit. The memory of the one time I'd been issued a fresh blanket and noticed the stark difference compared to the worn-out ones—turns out that hadn't been my imagination after all.